By: Barbara Zigah
Commodity linked currencies, led by the New Zealand Dollar, moved sharply higher versus the U.S. Dollar in Monday’s trading in Sydney. As reported at 10:35 a.m. in Sydney, the U.S. Dollar Index, a measure of the greenback’s value versus a group of major currencies, traded at 75.646 .DXY, a decline of .23%. The New Zealand Dollar rose 1.7% to $0.7370, the highest trade in nearly 2 weeks, following the news that New Zealand dairy producer, Fonterra Cooperative Group, Ltd., increased their payout to shareholders by nearly 20%, mirroring the rise in global dairy prices. Dairy accounts for the largest percentage of exports from New Zealand farmers, and the Fonterra Group is the largest dairy exporter in the world. The Australian Dollar also moved higher versus the U.S. Dollar, rising above $0.9200.
Further suppressing the U.S. currency was the worse-than-expected non-farms payroll data out of the U.S. which was released last Friday. The U.S. Labor Department reported that 190,000 jobs were shed in October, spurring the U.S. unemployment rate to a quarter-century high of 10.2%. One currency strategist commented that the data can be interpreted to mean that the Federal Reserve will continue to keep interest rates at historic lows.
Kiwi surges against U.S. Dollar
After working on Wall Street, Barb began her second career as a freelance writer at Daily Forex, where the CEO recognized fresh, untapped potential and was willing to give her a try. She’s never looked back. Since then, she’s worked steadily as a freelance writer and editor in the financial services and Forex-related industry.